For many Internet users, it is not always easy to write in languages that use unique character sets like Hindi, Hebrew and Arabic. Most computer keyboards only allow for the input of Roman characters (the alphabet used by most Western languages) and converting between scripts can be difficult. To make this process easier we launched an improved version of Google Transliteration at the end of last year, a service which enables you to phonetically convert Roman letters into a variety of other scripts.

Since you can’t use Google Transliteration offline we also launched the transliteration based “Input Method Editor” (IME) earlier this year. Once you download and install the Google Transliteration IME (don’t worry, it's free), you can type a word the way it sounds using Roman characters and the software will convert the word to its native script. For example, typing "hamesha" in Google Hindi IME transliterates into Hindi as: हमेशा.

Now what if you come across a language that you can speak but can’t read? For example, if you can speak Hindi, you may know that “namaste” is a greeting, however you may not be able to read ‘नमस्ते’ in Hindi script. Our new Script Converter tool converts a given web page or piece of text from one script to another so that you can read it phonetically. Script Converter currently supports 17 languages: Bengali, English, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Persian, Punjabi, Russian, Sanskrit, Serbian, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu.

Last July we enabled automatic page translations in Google Toolbar and we’ve been thrilled by the positive response. Today, we’re taking another step to make automatic translation easier. Now, if Google Toolbar’s default language is set to one of our supported languages, you can use our new Word Translator feature to hover over a word with your mouse and get an automatic instant translation. If you want Toolbar to translate into a different language, you can change it in the Toolbar Options menu.

Entire page translations are great if you have little knowledge of a given language. However, if you’re a multi-lingual user who just needs certain words translated, hovering is a lot quicker than searching word-by-word on Google Translate.

Here is an example of the word “vitesse” (speed) translated from French to German:

The new Word Translator feature is available for Internet Explorer and Firefox. And if you use Google Chrome, automatic page translation is already built in, and we're working to build more Translate features.

We hope this helps you browse pages in non-native languages faster, regardless of your language proficiency. Install the latest Toolbar version and give it a try!

If you live in the United States you probably saw our Parisian Love ad during the Super Bowl that famously highlighted Google Translate in the search results ("translate tu es très mignon"). Many users responded by making their own parody videos covering topics they felt passionate about.

We’re excited to say that today we launched a tool that allows any user to quickly and easily make their own Search Story video. You just have to put in the search queries you want and the tool does the rest! Check out this video that highlights translate in Google search:

As you can see, by typing “translate _______” into Google search you can see translations right on the search results page--as well as tell a pretty funny story. What sort of videos will you make?

With Google Translate we are always iterating, adding new features and improving translation quality. Today we would like to highlight a few of the features we’ve added recently.

In November 2009 we launched a “text-to-speech” feature which allowed users to hear words and sentences in English read out loud by Google Translate. Since then we’ve added Haitian Creole and in March added French, Italian, and German to the list of supported languages. To hear any of languages out loud, just click the icon next to the translation when you visit translate.google.com.

In addition, we have recently doubled the number of languages that support transliterated input. Last year we announced that you could type transliterated Arabic, Hindi, and Persian. We have now extended that functionality to Greek, Russian and Serbian. With all of these languages you can type transliterated words in roman script and have the script converted automatically. Go ahead and check it out!

While we are on the topic of transliteration, the labs product Google Transliteration has recently added Hebrew, Oriya and Sinhalese to its supported languages. We expect to have Hebrew transliteration working in Google Translate soon as well.

Added on 4/14/10: Hindi and Spanish "text-to-speech" are now live on Google Translate as well.

For millennia man and animal have tolerantly coexisted, separated by language and the development of opposable thumbs. Today we can proudly say that we have overcome one of those hurdles. Presenting Google Translate for Animals, a new application available in Android Market.

This application allows you to record animals sounds and have the sounds analyzed and translated into English by Google Translate. With animal translation you can now finally understand why Spot keeps peeing in your closet or why Pickles keeps leaving dead mice in the tub. No longer must humanity struggle to comprehend when Lassie warns, “Hurry, Timmy’s fallen down the well!”

The technology isn’t perfect yet, so you may discover some translations that don’t make perfect sense. The algorithms are always improving however, thanks to the large corpus of cute cat videos that have been uploaded to YouTube.

We think that this is an exciting step in understanding and communicating with the world around us. Stay tuned for the addition of “old car” and “stomach” to the translation capabilities of the application this summer.